Heart felt Tweet tribute

What happened prior to the Northwestern State-Lamar women's basketball game brought a tear to many people's eyes in attendance, including mine.

Tweet Williams, a junior point guard from Spring, Texas, was diagnosed with a heart condition prior to the start of the season.  It's a condition (irregular heartbeat) that is being treated and she'll live a normal life. 

However, that condition has cut short her basketball career.  So on Saturday, head coach Jennifer Graf drew up a plan where she could get one more start as a Lady Demon in a "mock" start prior to the tip.

Lamar's coach agreed to it as did the officials.

So Tweet was announced in the starting lineup and took the floor one last time.

The two teams tipped off.  Tweet's twin sister, Brittney Williams, a forward for the Lady Cardinals, tipped the ball to Tweet as she dribbled it down the floor right before the officials halted play.  Tweet and Brittney exchanged hugs first then everyone else followed.

She then received a standing ovation from the crowd as she left the floor.

Matthew Bonnette

NSU Sports Information

Visits from Stephanie Shaw Locke, Joe Fields

Didn't have to leave the office today to visit with two former NSU student-athletes, Stephanie Shaw Locke (women's basketball, 1992-96 player, 1997-99 coach) and Joseph (we knew him as Joe) Fields (football, 1999-2001, defensive lineman).

Stephanie was first through, on campus driving a bus for a school trip from DeSoto Parish, where she teaches and coaches. We enjoyed looking through her player file at the old hairstyles and catching up on teammates like Nancy Hebert, Shirlynda Williams, Joskeen Garner and more, along with players she coached like Jamila Newman, and her coaches, James Smith and Wendy Schuller.

She has two daughters, 8 and 4, with hubby Chris. Yes, they are ball players. One is quiet like Chris, the other bubbly like Steph.

Joe was part of a sales team from Richo Americas Corp. visiting campus to consider printing options for the university. He is Branch Sales Manager in Baton Rouge.

He had run into Coach Bradley Dale Peveto in Baton Rouge recently and enjoyed the visit, and was trying to connect with his old Demon teammate, Dr. William Broussard, while on campus.

(I also need to get in a long overdue mention of a great visit last fall with Randy Bullock, who has left coaching and athletic administration in Texas and is a regional representative for FieldTurf. "Bull" has always been one of my favorites, especially after he married softball shortstop Robin Gatto, who is doing great in the administrative field in their central Texas school district.)

Seeing folks like those makes every long day and late night worthwhile. They are doing great in life and they have great pride in Northwestern. Talk about a feel good Friday morning, this was one.

Doug Ireland, SID

Good stuff on Trey Gilder

Looks like the NBA Draft in June might include former NSU Demon Trey Gilder, who is lighting up the NBA Developmental League for the Colorado 14ers.

Check this link for an independent perspective, and a funny promotional video involving Trey:

http://www.ridiculousupside.com/2009/2/18/763647/14er-trey-gilder-draft-eli

Funny sight and good vibrations

I made my first road trip with the Demon basketball team in a month Friday, riding the bus with the boys to Conway, Ark., for Saturday's game at Central Arkansas.

There was an obvious upswing in the vibe around the team all day long, despite their on-court struggles. The players now seem closer and clearly are having fun while they work toward improving their performance in uniforms.

There was frequent laughter during the evening shootaround at the Ferris Center, capped by the entire squad mimicing injured freshman James Hulbin, who has torn ligaments in his right elbow he sustained in a practice fall at the outset of the SLC season in early January. Now that's not funny, but by now, watching the right-hander work left-handed has become commonplace and quite amusing to his teammates.

The frivolity included head coach Mike McConathy, who led the team on the court with a stumbling, exaggerated imitation of the on-the-move 3-pointer that his son, Michael, hit to end the first half of last year's dramatic win at UCA. Clumsy would be a kind description of Coach Dad's version of Michael's awkward but on-target buzzer beater last season.

Michael later tried to replicate Colby Bargeman's game-winning running 8-footer, leaning in and off glass, with 0.5 second left in overtime last year. Let's just say that the shot is a lot easier if you are 6-foot-6, not 5-9.

I had driven on my own to Nicholls and Stephen F. Austin, and due to football's National Signing Day haul on Feb. 4, was unable to get away in time to make it to Lake Charles for a 7 o'clock game that night. I was happy to miss that one, as it turned out, except for missing the chance to visit with friends like Cowboys coach Dave Simmons, McNeese SID Louis Bonnette and Cowboys AD and former Demon footballer and javelin thrower Tommy McClelland.

Seeing this group enjoying each other's company, which was not the case earlier this season, was refreshing and encouraging. Let's hope it carries over to good play Saturday. I think it will.

BTW - the team watched the movie "The Express," the story of the late, great Heisman Trophy-winning Syracuse running back Ernie Davis, on the drive up. It's not the best sports movie ever, but it was inspiring and pretty well done overall. The ubiquitous shots of the sports media are laughable at every turn ... writers weren't really pounding their typewriters at the outset of an afternoon football game, for example; and the thuggery of opposing players, with the Cotton Bowl game against Texas breaking out into a bench-clearing brawl, was far past cinematic license. But the bottom line product was a solid B.

Just wish that the movie folks would let a real great story be told completely truthfully. The message would have been just as effective.

Address changes, accolades for ex-Demons

Former Demon offensive line coach Blake Miller, whose coaching ability might have been exceeded by his considerable culinary talents during his two years (1998-99) on the NSU football staff, is moving west.

Miller has been on the staff at Rice for the past three years. He's been hired as the O-line coach at Utah.

Miller will be in the capitol of the Morman religion with the Utes, coaching in a stadium the world knows as the site of the 2002 Winter Olympics ....

... NSU three-sport athlete and former academic advisor extraordinare Julie Lessiter is back in the business. Lessiter left NSU last January to enter private business, to see if she would enjoy living a "normal" lifestyle working managing a medical practice in Shreveport-Bossier.

She's been announced now as the associate AD for student services and senior woman administrator at Arkansas State.

There she'll be working again with some old friends, head football coach Steve Roberts and several of his staff who were at NSU before heading up to northeast Arkansas in the winter of 2001.

The Southampton, England native made a huge difference in the lives of many student-athletes during her time at NSU, serving nine years as the "academic coach" for Demons and Lady Demons.

She played tennis, ran cross country and ran track for NSU during her undergraduate days. She has two undergraduate degrees from Northwestern ....

...The 1995 Southland Conference baseball player of the year is turning into a heck of a football recruiter. Terry Joseph was spotlighted by Rivals.com for his job as recruiting coordinator at Louisiana Tech, where he is also the secondary coach.

TJ was listed as one of the top 10 recruiters at non-BCS schools in the bowl subdivision.